I have an hour to kill, what the hell...
People use them around here like they are gospel, when are they are really telling you is about shots for/shots against.
They can add a dimension of analysis, but a lot of people mistakenly rely on them as a proxy for a player's overall effectiveness.
Corsi and Fenwick are roughly 90% accurate to possession of the puck. Possession of the puck is what wins games. Babcock himself said "possession is everything". If you have possession of the puck for 60 minutes of a hockey game, it's almost impossible to lose - if you have the puck, the other team doesn't, and if the other team doesn't have the puck, the other team doesn't shoot it.
If a player has a Corsi ratio of 45%, that means, about 45% of the time, the opposing team has the puck in your defensive zone. How is that NOT measuring a player's effectiveness?
Obviously sample sizes play into it; there will be shifts occasionally where a player has very little impact on what happens on the ice, and there will be bad games here and there, but over a large enough sample size, Corsi is an incredible tool for measuring a player's effectiveness.
The thing about hockey is it's a team sport, and team stats are a better predictor for wins than individual stats. Stats in baseball are very useful because baseball is really an individual sport. It's always 1 vs 1.
A good example is: Let's say you have your number 1 D-man playing 30 min a night and he's awesome with those minutes. You also have a #3 playing 20 min a night and is also awesome. Good point totals, good +/- etc. If that top D gets injured and then the #3 has to cover the extra minutes, quite often you'll see his point totals dip along with the rest of the stats because he cant handle the extra minutes.
Jay Bouwmeester (I think) is a great example of this. I think if he played less minutes you'd see better point totals out of him because playing the minutes he does he can only really play defensively, and can't really be physical due to fatigue.
I think you have the right concept, but you're applying it the wrong way. It's not that added minutes decreases a players' effectiveness; it's that a #3 dman typically doesn't face the top opposition. When a top defenseman goes down, SOMEBODY has to take over the role of shutting down the opposing top line, and there are very, very few teams in the league who have a 2nd line that is equally talented offensively.
Adding minutes to a player isn't really a problem (unless their conditioning is an issue); it's what kind of minutes they get. Most players in the league will perform better if they're given more even strength minutes on an offensive zone faceoff, or against 3rd/4th lines and 3rd defense pairings, or more powerplay minutes... The same way most players in the league will perform worse if they face tougher competition, start in the defensive zone more, or get more PK time.
True, something that measured scoring chances in the same fashion, rather then shots, would likely be better, or at very least a good compliment.
A lot of teams have their scoring chances tracked by a 3rd party; for more information check
here but the results really aren't terribly surprising. Good teams have a high Corsi and get more scoring chances, bad teams have a poor Corsi and give up more scoring chances than they create.
The Rangers often don't pursue the puck hard in the defensive zone. They just clog the middle of the ice, letting the opponents cycle the puck along the perimeter while they clog the shooting lanes, to ensure the shots are either blocked or wide. It's not surprising they have a poor Corsi, it doesn't, in my opinion, indicate they are any poorer of a team, it will just take 5 years of Dan Girardi's life.
Tying lack of injuries to Corsi is a point that needs further explanation.
The system a team plays certainly impacts their Corsi/Fenwick numbers... but at the same time, the more the Rangers allow the puck in their zone to float around, the less time they have to put the puck in the net at the other end.
In a game where a lot of goals happen because of lucky bounces, the more time the puck spends in the offensive zone, the more likely it's YOUR team that benefits from the bounce.
That's the same reason people don't think Preds are good. Rangers and Preds are all about preventing good scoring chances and allowing shots they know their goaltenders will have a good chance stopping.
Any system that treats every shot the same will be mostly blind to why these teams are succeeding. Not all shots are created equal.
Nashville is in the same boat as what I said above; they are riding an extremely good goaltender and good defensive system, along with an extremely high shooting percentage.
It's not possible to consistently create better scoring chances on your own without giving them up, which makes sense if you apply it to the game. How often will you see a risky pinch from a Nashville defender? It doesn't happen; that's why they don't give up many odd-man rushes and that's why Rinne is a fantasy goldmine as long as Trotz is around. Compare that to a team like Vancouver, who sends a defenseman as a 4th forward frequently, and instead rely on above average goaltending to bail them out from odd-man rushes.
New York and Nashville are high in the standings, yes, but they're also 4rd and 3rd (respectively) in 5v5 shooting percentage. If (and when) that shooting percentage drops out from under them, their record is going to crater. If you don't think shooting percentages can crater, look at Toronto and Boston's seasons...
They have a strategy, and so far, it's working. It's not a coincidence that both are getting unbelievable performances from workhorse goaltenders too... I'm just saying that their strategy is working, but probably not as reliable. Could it get them a cup? Certainly; stranger things have happened... but as Holland said, the best you can do is a build a team that will compete for the cup, and hope you win it every 5 years or so. You need a lot of things to go right in the playoffs to win a cup - you need your stars to perform, your role players to exceed expectations, solid to great goaltending, and good special teams. In any given playoffs, at least one of the top-8 teams will have all those things going for them and they'll be very, VERY tough to beat.
Relying on something uncontrollable like bounces (a.k.a. shooting percentage) is just one more thing that can go wrong, and it's why I'll bet against Nashville and the Rangers (despite the fact I like both teams. Nashville moreso.)
Corsi may tell us something at the team level but it's near useless when considering individuals. Problem is that you need to be a fanatic in order to use it for individual players. The results often aren't pretty. These are some posts from a Scott Gomez thread made by a person who shall go unnamed.
In my experience at least, this kind of attitude is the norm rather than the exception when discussing something with the advanced stats crowd. Primarily through Outscoring Champion of the World Shawn Horcoff.
The best way to learn about a player is to watch him play. Stats can be useful, but they completely skew reality when used as a primary method of analysis. No pun intended.
Whomever posted that stuff about Gomez has the right idea, but like I said previously, probably did more damage to his idea because he fumbled it from the start.
Cam Charron
explains it better than I could:
Consider puck possession. One of the best stats for evaluating team performance is score-tied Team Fenwick rate (all shots at the net minus blocked shots for and again), a good measure of puck possession and an excellent predictor of future team success. Using data obtained via timeonice.com here, here, here, here and here, I filtered out the stretches of games that Scott Gomez missed this season.
I found that with Gomez in the lineup, the Canadiens have had a team possession rate with the score tied of 53.5%. Without him, it was 44.6%. Why is this important? Well, here's the overall team rank with Gomez in the lineup:
Rank|Team|Fenwick Rate
3|Pittsburgh|54.9%
4|Chicago|53.9%
5|Montreal|53.5%
6|San Jose|52.6%
7|Boson|52.4%
...and without...
Rank|Team|Fenwick Rate
26|Buffalo|46.7%
27|Anaheim|46.0%
28|Montreal|44.6%
29|Nashville|44.3%
30|Minnesota|43.7%
The rest of the article is worth a read. Gomez is, in a lot of ways, like Mason Raymond - a guy taking a ****-kicking from fans, but in reality, contributes a lot more than people notice.
Another great read regarding Gomez can be found at
Habs Eyes On The Prize.
Advanced Stats aren't meant to be used as absolute gospel, and people who write about/using advanced numbers will tell you that.
That's why it evolves to Fenwick.
Raw Corsi is also good to understand for beginners, but Corsi Rel and Corsi Rel QoC are better indicators because they used other factors.
The reason this stuff gets used as a proxy is because no one can possibly watch all 1230 NHL games let alone watch all 1230 NHL games AND properly evaluate players.
This is the problem Nashville runs into, because they've been proven to be successful at it for years, but it wouldn't translate into the playoffs since it's not the regular season.
http://blogs.thescore.com/nhl/2012/...edicting-nashvilles-regression-five-theories/
http://www.arcticicehockey.com/2011/11/28/2591407/fun-with-pdo
Unless you honestly think Kent Huskins
that good, Shot Quality is roughly 11% of the game. Advanced Stats covers the other 89%.
This needs more attention. Great post.
Devil fans use them a lot... but I ignore them...
I've played enough hockey, watched enough games at EVERY level... Peewee, midget, bantam, juniors, echl, ahl, swedish elite league, khl, nhl, international, and so on that I don't have to look at stupid corsi numbers to find out if a player is a good player, playing well, and so on.
No matter how much hockey you've watched, you haven't watched as much as Don Cherry. He said advanced stats were freaking useless too, and was pissed off when people used them to declare Ryan Johnson a terrible player..
That was almost exactly two years ago. Now? Ryan Johnson is out of the league, released from training camp after dressing for just 34 games in Chicago the year before.
People don't always know what to look for in a hockey player... For example, someone might see a player with excellent hustle to negate a scoring chance and think "hey, that was a great play" but they don't realize that the scoring chance wouldn't have happened if the player hadn't been out of position in the first place.
If you think you've got that mastered, then that's fine, but I don't think it's a coincidence that the GMs who have been more or less confirmed as using advanced statistical analysis are:
Chiarelli (Boston, recent cup winner)
Shero (Pittsburgh, recent cup winner)
Gillis (Vancouver, recent cup finalist / presidents trophy)
Holland (Detroit, perennial contender)
Wilson (San Jose, back to back WCFs)
Maloney (Phoenix, consistently outperforms his teams' perceived talent level)
...versus guys who are more or less confirmed to think they're baloney...
Burke (Toronto)
Howson (Columbus)
Tambellini/Lowe (Edmonton)
I don't think advanced stats are everything - certainly you also need a coach who can
properly evaluate how to deploy players:
In Buffalo, Hodgson is playing an expanded role, facing superior competition, and starting equally as many shifts in the defensive-zone as he's starting in the offensive-zone. As a result, Hodgson's Corsi numbers have run off a cliff.
With Hodgson on the ice, Buffalo has controlled 38.1% of on-ice shots, and with the score tied that numbers gets even uglier (34%). That's down significantly from 48.9% of shots that the Canucks managed to control with Hodgson on the ice.
...you also need to look at chemistry (getting more from the sum than the individual parts), systems, etc. You can't just grab the best Relative Corsi players in free agency and start winning.
That said, they're a powerful tool, and ignoring them when their results are becoming more and more proven is a bit silly in my opinion.
Unlike advanced stats in baseball, there are too many factors that these stats don't take into account which make them all but useless.
What makes them useless?
Corsi has been proven to correlate highly with possession of the puck - if a team takes 60% of the shots when <player> is on the ice, then it's reasonable to assert that the team has possession of the puck about 60% of the time.
If you look at what kind of competition he faces (the average Rel Corsi of the opposing players while he's on the ice), where he starts his shifts (does his coach put him in defensive or offensive situations), how lucky/unlucky he's been (his teams shooting percentage and save percentage with him on the ice)... How does that
not paint a picture of what kind of results he produces?
Hockey is a fluid game and it doesn't lend itself nearly as easily to stats as baseball does. Mircrostats are interesting and sometimes illuminating but I don't give them much weight. On our forum we've had people defending Gomez for two years because his CORSI is good. It's like CORSI has become the standard by which a player is successful or not. Way too much weight is given to them by some people and actual production takes a back seat.
If you've ever watched Gomez, he takes the puck brings it into the opposing zone very well but then... nothing. He's pretty ineffective and his point totals are a reflection of his uselessness. However, his CORSI is strong and so some folks assume he's playing great hockey. CORSI and other microstats are interesting but they shouldn't replace actual totals when analyzing a player's offensive performance.
People who point to Moneyball and baseball are missing the boat. With every at bat in baseball there is an empirical result. It is a statistically driven game that lends itself to that kind of statistical analysis.
Hockey is a much more fluid game and it's difficult to nail down with stats. Look at hits for example. All hits are measured the same. But does a hit from Brian Gionta feel the same as one from Chara? No. But there's no way to measure this. There's no way to measure the impact of what that hit has except via maybe... wins or +/- but even then there are tons of variables like goaltending, opponent ect...
As another example I"m not sure how CORSI is supposed to meaningfully show us how effective a player really is. It certainly doesn't always match up with production from players. Gomez is exhibit A. As I mentioned above, he was terrible despite those CORSI numbers.
I would expect that Brett Hull would be exhibit B. That guy didn't hold onto the puck too much. He didn't carry it into the zone and he didn't dipsy doodle around defenseman. But he was one of the best offensive threats of his generation. Puck would be on his stick and then in the net. I would guess that his CORSI wouldn't be all that strong but... so what? The guy was a beast. Again, CORSI might tell you that he wasn't a puck possession guy but I don't think that really means all that much in the grand scheme of things. It's certainly not an accurate predictor of how effective a player he was.
Moreover, there's the problem of the accuracy of the microstats themselves. Look at giveaways/takeaways... it's an official NHL stat and there's huge variances all over the league. If the NHL can't get it right on something that seems so simple then I'm not sure how we can really trust a bunch of bloggers with microstats that aren't officially kept by the league itself.
These aren't just bloggers creating fancy concepts out of a basement. These are concepts created by people who actually do contract work for NHL teams. Corsi is named after someone who worked with the Buffalo Sabres organization. Successful teams track Nielson numbers (basically scoring chance +/-), which is named after a successful NHL coach.
You used the word Corsi a lot, but if advanced statistics are a painting, Corsi is the type of paint used. It's important, but absolutely USELESS on it's own. If you don't understand how successful players contribute to their high Corsi, or why poor players contribute to a bad Corsi... If you don't understand (again) how a coach is deploying a player - there's a HUGE difference between facing the 3rd/4th lines and getting offensive zone starts, and facing top competition starting in your own end... If you don't look at underrated factors such as faceoff %, penalty-drawing (which is a proven talent)... Looking at Corsi alone
easily is more harmful than advantageous.
Can someone post the advanced stats of the top 5 scorers? I expect Giroux to have highest qual comp and most defensive draw percentage.
The thing is... the top-5 NHL scorers aren't the best offensive players in the game. They're probably top-15, and CERTAINLY top-50, but there's so much "noise" in point totals, because points happen so rarely.
Here's what I mean: When Ryan Getzlaf has been on the ice this year (and I mean at 5v5 only), the Ducks have shot 7.12%. That's below league average, and 8th of 10 Ducks forwards with 40+ games played. Not coincidentally, he's having a very "poor" year with 48 points in 71 games (
55 point pace).
Last year, with Getzlaf on the ice, the Ducks shot 11.97%. That's
significantly higher than league average - and the abnormally high shooting percentage is what the Ducks rode to a 4th seed (despite a mediocre-at-best goal differential). Also not coincidentally, Getzlaf had a "great" year with 76 points in 67 games (
93 point pace).
Looking at his other 'metrics' comparing the two years:
Year|5v5 TOI (rank)|Quality of Competition (rank)|Offensive zone starts|Relative Corsi|Team shooting percentage with Getzlaf on the ice
10-11|17.06 (1st)|0.709 (4th)|46.6%|+12.5|11.97%
11-12|16.43 (1st)|0.812 (3rd)|47.8%|+13.0|7.12%
Comparing the last two seasons for Getzlaf... He's gotten slightly less ice time, though both years he led the team. He's facing slightly tougher competition, ranking him roughly the same on the team though. He's starting in the offensive zone just a little bit more often. He's pushing play forward extremely well despite all that, both years, with a very good Corsi - considering he's facing the toughest opposition, starting in the defensive zone more often than not, and getting a lot of ice time, he's actually a fantastic two-way player. Does a great job of getting the puck from the D to the O zone.
Pretty much the only significant difference? Last year he was incredibly, incredibly lucky (as was Perry, who rode the same luck train to a Richard and Hart trophy) and this year, despite facing similar competition, despite starting his shifts in the same ratio of d-zone to o-zone, despite getting a similar amount of ice time, his offensive production has dropped off a cliff.
So.. you can see how much the percentages play into points... and how the percentages are unsustainable and mostly 'luck'.
That's why the Art Ross has become so difficult to win and we've seen so many new winners.. There are so many great offensive players that you need to be great offensively AND get some lucky bounces to win.
Corsi is the stupidest stat ever I'm pretty sure
That was the stupidest post ever I'm pretty sure.
That's the other thing, and to fully buy in may mean to compromise your own way of thinking. Not an easy thing to convince someone to do (and when ASA people can't do it, that's when some of them dismiss people as stupid, dumb, etc.)
It doesn't make anyone dumb if they don't get it or immediately buy in. It's just like learning anything else, learning one thing before the next.
Or start with James Mirtle:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/hockey/the-moneypuck-revolution/article2178766/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/spor...ed-stats-caught-on-in-the-nhl/article2178777/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/hockey/hockeys-new-numbers/article2178781/
Another beauty. GKJ is nailing it.
Cheerio, as you were...